New York Spousal Support Lawyer
Welcome to Spodek Law Group. Our goal is to give you the reality of spousal support in New York - not the sanitized version divorce websites present, not the calculator fiction that makes people think there's a simple formula, but the actual truth about what happens when a marriage ends and money becomes the battlefield.
Heres the thing most people searching for a spousal support lawyer at 2am dont want to hear: that maintenance calculator everyone obsesses over is essentially a suggestion. The New York courts even call it an "advisory guideline." Advisory. Not mandatory. Not binding. A judge can look at your case, look at the calculator number, and award something completely different - as long as they write down which of the 13 discretionary factors justified their decision.
That's not a formula. That's a negotiation disguised as math.
The Calculator Lie Nobody Explains
You've probably already found the New York maintenance calculator online. Plugged in your numbers. Maybe felt relieved or terrified by what came out. Either way, you're operating on a fundamental misunderstanding of how this actually works.
The calculator only applies to income up to $228,000 (as of March 2025). If the paying spouse earns more then that - which describes a significant percentage of the divorces that require serious legal representation - the calculator becomes meaningless. Above that threshold, the court has complete discretion. Complete. There is no formula. There is only argument, evidence, and which side presents the more compelling narrative about who deserves what.
But heres were it gets worse. Even BELOW $228,000, judges can deviate from the guideline amount. They just have to explain why in a written order. And with 13 acceptable factors to choose from - ranging from "age and health" to "any other factor the court believes is just and proper" - finding a justification isnt exactly difficult.
Think about that. The thing your basing your financial planning on? Its not a rule. Its a starting point for negotation.
What Happens Above $228,000
OK so lets say your a high earner. You've built a succesful career. You make $400,000 a year. What does the calculator tell you about your maintenance obligation?
Nothing. Literaly nothing.
The formula applies to the first $228,000. The remaining $172,000 of your income? That's up to the judge. Your spouse's attorney will argue that the "marital standard of living" - one of the 13 factors - justifies taking a significant percentage of that remaining income. Your attorney will argue your spouse's "earning capacity" means they should be working, not collecting checks from you.
Who wins? The side with the better story. The side with the better evidence of who sacrificed what during the marriage. The side whose lawyer understands how to frame those 13 factors in there favor.
This is why high-asset divorces require agressive legal representation from day one. Your not fighting over a formula. Your fighting over the narrative of your entire marriage - who contributed, who sacrificed, whose career was enabled by whose support.
At Spodek Law Group, we've handled hundreds of these cases. We know how judges in Manhattan think differently then judges in Brooklyn. We know which factors resonate and which fall flat. We know how to build the evidentiary record that wins.
The 13 Factors That Actually Decide Your Case
Lets get specific. When a judge decides to deviate from the guideline - or when income exceeds $228,000 and their working from scratch - they consider these factors under Domestic Relations Law Section 236:
- The age and health of both parties
- Present and future earning capacity
- The need for education or training to become self-sufficient
- Reduced earning capacity from giving up career opportunities during the marriage
- The presence of children requiring care
- The tax consequences to each party (more on this later)
- Any wasteful dissipation of marital property
- Any transfers of assets in contemplation of divorce
- The duration of the marriage
- Acts of domestic violence that inhibited earning capacity
- Contributions as homemaker or to the other spouse's career
- The existence of pre-marital cohabitation
- Any other factor the court deems just and proper
Read that last one again. "Any other factor." That's not a limitation. That's a blank check.
Heres the thing - each of these factors is a battlefield. Your spouse says they "gave up their career" for the family. Did they? Or did they choose not to work because they preferred not to? Your spouse says you "dissipated marital assets." Did you? Or were those legitimate business expenses?
Every factor becomes an argument. Every argument requires evidence. And the side that prepares better - that documents better, that presents better - controls the outcome.
As Todd Spodek often tells clients: the facts matter less then how the facts are presented. Two people can describe the same marriage and sound like they lived completely different lives. The question is which description the judge finds more credible.
Why Cohabitation Wont Save You
Heres a fantasy many paying spouses cling to: my ex starts living with someone new, I stop paying maintenance. Simple, right?
Wrong. Catastrophicaly, expensively wrong.
New York law does allow for termination or modification of maintenance under Domestic Relations Law Section 248 if the recipient is "living with another person in a romantic relationship and holding themselves out as that persons spouse." But the courts have interpreted this so narrowly that it basicly doesnt exist as a practical option.
Consider Bliss v. Bliss from 1985 - still the controlling precedent. The ex-wife lived with her male companion for fourteen years. Fourteen. The ex-husband went to court to terminate support. The court said no. Why? Because simply living together, even for fourteen years, isnt enough. She wasnt "holding herself out" as his spouse.
Let that sink in.
Or look at Fecteau v. Fecteau from 2012. The couple lived together for two years. She paid no rent, no utilities. She borrowed money from him. They shared household chores. They had what the court acknowledged was a "romantic relationship." She named him the beneficiary of her life insurance policy.
The court still found no "spousal relationship."
So what exactly DOES qualify? The courts have been remarkably unclear. But what's crystal clear is this: if your counting on cohabitation to end your maintenance obligation, your probably going to spend $20,000-$50,000 in legal fees to lose.
And heres the real kicker - while your fighting that battle, your still paying. Every month. While your lawyer bills you every hour.
The Timeline Trap: What Happens When You Wait
This is were alot of people destroy there own cases before they even realize there's a fight happening.
Your spouse files for divorce first. Within days, they file for temporary maintenance - support paid DURING the divorce proceeding, not after. The court applies the formula (which is actually mandatory for temporary support, unlike post-divorce maintenance). You start paying.
Now your in a bind. Your paying maintenance while ALSO paying your own legal fees. Your burning through savings. The divorce drags on for months, maybe years.
By the time you get to the final maintenance determination, you've established a pattern. You've been paying $8,000 a month for 18 months. The judge looks at that and thinks: clearly you can afford it. You've been doing it.
Your own compliance becomes evidence against you.
This is why timing matters. The first person to file often controls the narrative. They set the temporary support level. They establish the payment pattern. They frame the marriage in their petition.
If you think divorce is coming - or if you've already been served - every day you wait is a day your spouse is building there case while you research alone. Todd Spodek has seen this pattern destroy peoples positions completly. People who could have had reasonable outcomes end up with devistating ones because they waited too long to get serious representation.
Tax Nightmares: Federal vs. State Reality
Heres a hidden connection most people miss untill tax time creates a crisis.
At the federal level, alimony is NOT tax deductible for the person paying. This changed in 2019 with the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. If your paying $5,000 a month in maintenance, you dont get to deduct that from your federal taxable income. Its coming out of your after-tax dollars.
But New York state did something wierd. They didnt change their law to match. At the state level, maintenance payments ARE still tax deductible for the payor - and taxable income for the recipient.
So you end up filing returns that tell contradicting stories. Federaly, its like the payment never happened. At the state level, its a deduction.
This creates planning nightmares. The recipient's attorney will emphasize the federal reality - "my client receives $60,000 a year but keeps all of it, they need more." Your attorney has to explain the state deduction matters too - but only for New York taxes, which are a fraction of the federal burden.
Most divorcing couples dont think about this untill theyve already agreed to a number. Then reality hits at tax time and someone feels cheated.
Modification: Another Courtroom Battle
OK so you've survived the divorce. Your paying $6,000 a month. Its been three years. Then your company downsizes and your income drops by 40%.
Surely you can reduce your maintenance payment, right?
Maybe. If you can prove a "substantial change in circumstances." If you can document that the change is involuntary. If you can demonstrate you didnt engineer the income reduction to avoid paying. The modification standards are strict and require substantial evidence.
But heres what nobody tells you: proving this requires going back to court. Hiring lawyers again. Presenting evidence again. Having your finances examined again.
And during the months or years that modification proceeding takes, your still paying the original amount. Miss a payment and you face contempt charges. Cant afford the payment AND the legal fees to reduce it? Tough. The system wasnt designed with that contradiction in mind.
At Spodek Law Group, we handle modification cases regularly. We know what constitutes "substantial change" and what judges will dismiss as normal life fluctuation. We know how to document involuntary income changes to distinguish them from strategic choices. We know the difference between a case worth fighting and one that will cost more then it saves.
Duration: The Advisory Schedule That Isnt Really a Schedule
How long will you pay maintenance? Or how long will you recieve it? Everyone wants a simple answer. The advisory duration schedule provides what looks like one:
- Marriage of 0 to 15 years: Maintenance for 15-30% of the marriage length
- Marriage of 15 to 20 years: Maintenance for 30-40% of the marriage length
- Marriage over 20 years: Maintenance for 35-50% of the marriage length
Sounds clear, right? Notice the word "advisory." Notice the ranges. A 15-year marriage could mean maintenance for 2.25 years (15% of 15) or 4.5 years (30% of 15). Thats a 100% difference. And judges can go outside these ranges entirely if they find the schedule would be "unjust or inappropriate."
What determines where you land in that range? The same 13 factors that control everything else. The same arguments, the same evidence, the same presentation skills.
And heres the uncomfortable truth nobody wants to acknowledge: lifetime maintenance still exists. For very long marriages - especialy where one spouse never developed earning capacity - judges sometimes award maintenance with no end date. Forever payments. Untill death or remarriage.
The statute doesn't mandate this. The statute doesn't prohibit it either. Its discretionary. Like everything else in this system.
The Earning Capacity Trap
Sound familiar? Your spouse hasnt worked in fifteen years. They have a degree, maybe even professional credentials, but theyve been home with children. Now they claim they cant work.
Their attorney argues reduced earning capacity - factor #4. They gave up their career for the family. They sacrificed their professional development. They need maintenance to compensate.
But heres were it gets complicated. Your attorney will argue earning capacity - factor #2. They COULD work. They choose not to. They have skills, credentials, the ability to earn. Maintenance should account for what they could make, not just what they actualy make.
See the problem? Both arguments use statutory factors. Both are valid under the law. Both lead to completely different maintenance calculations.
The judge has to decide which story is more convincing. Were they a sacrifice for the family, or a choice against working? Did the marriage prevent their career, or did they simply prefer staying home?
Evidence matters here. Did your spouse ever apply for jobs? Did they maintain professional certifications? Did they discuss returning to work? Did you encourage them to stay home, or did they resist returning?
Emails. Text messages. Social media posts. Credit card statements showing networking lunches. Professional development courses. All of this becomes evidence in the earning capacity argument.
And yes, your spouse's attorney is probably already gathering this evidence while your reading articles online.
Pre-Marital Cohabitation: The Clock Started Before the Wedding
Heres a hidden connection that surprises most people. Factor #12 explicitly allows courts to consider "the existence and duration of pre-marital cohabitation."
You lived together for three years before getting married? That might count toward the "duration" calculation for maintenance purposes. A 10-year marriage might be treated like a 13-year marriage if you cohabited first.
This cuts both ways. For recipients, it extends the relationship length and potentialy increases duration. For payors, it means the clock started earlier then they realized.
Did you maintain seperate residences while essentialy living together? How often did you stay over? Did you share expenses? Did you present yourselves as a couple to friends and family?
All of this becomes relevant. All of this becomes evidence. All of this affects how the judge calculates duration.
Most people dont think about their pre-marital living situation when divorce happens. But their spouse's attorney absolutly does.
The Domestic Violence Factor Nobody Discusses
Factor #10 addresses "acts of domestic violence that inhibited earning capacity." This works in two directions that surprise people.
If your spouse claims domestic violence affected their ability to work - through trauma, through controlling behavior, through physical limitation - that affects maintenance calculations. Their reduced earning capacity becomes your increased payment obligation.
But the inverse is also true. If YOU experienced domestic violence that your spouse perpetrated, that can affect their maintenance claims. Courts can consider whether the maintenance recipient's own behavior contributed to the situation.
This is sensitive territory. Cases involving domestic violence allegations require particuarly careful handling. Evidence must be documented. Timelines must be established. The connection between alleged behavior and earning capacity must be proven.
At Spodek Law Group, we handle cases involving these allegations with the seriousness they deserve - whether defending against false claims or documenting real abuse that affects the maintenance calculation.
Dissipation: When Spending Becomes a Weapon
Factor #7 covers "wasteful dissipation of marital property." This sounds technical. In practice, its one of the most contentious battlegrounds in high-asset divorces.
Did you buy your mistress jewelry? Dissipation. Did you gamble away $50,000? Dissipation. Did you hide money in accounts your spouse didnt know about? Thats both dissipation and potentially contempt.
But the line gets murky. Was that expensive car a legitimate purchase or wasteful spending? Was that investment a reasonable business decision or an attempt to hide assets? Was that gift to family generous or strategic?
Dissipation claims can go back years before the divorce was filed. If the court finds dissipation, it affects both equitable distribution AND maintenance calculations. The dissipating spouse might pay more, for longer.
And heres the scary part - your spouse's attorney is already going through your credit card statements, your bank records, your financial history, looking for anything that might qualify as dissipation. Every purchase becomes potential evidence. Every transfer becomes suspicious.
This is why financial documentation matters from day one. This is why you need an attorney reviewing your records before the other side does.
The Standard of Living Calculation
"Standard of living during the marriage" isnt explicitly one of the 13 factors. But it underlies almost everything else - especialy earning capacity, self-sufficiency needs, and that catch-all "any other factor" provision.
What was your lifestyle during the marriage? Private schools for children? Vacation homes? Expensive cars? Fine dining?
The court considers whether the recipient spouse can maintain something aproximating that lifestyle on their own income. If they cant, maintenance helps bridge the gap.
But standard of living is subjective. It depends on what you spent, where you lived, how you presented yourselves. And unlike income, theres no calculator for lifestyle.
Your spouse's attorney will paint a picture of an extravagant lifestyle that requires generous maintenance to sustain. Your attorney will argue the lifestyle was inflated, unsustainable, not representative of what the recipient actualy needs.
Photos of vacations. Records of club memberships. Receipts from expensive restaurants. All of this becomes evidence of "standard of living." All of this affects the maintenance calculation.
Think about that. Every expensive dinner you ever paid for becomes potential evidence that you owe more in maintenance. Every luxury purchase becomes a baseline for what your spouse "needs."
What Your Spouse's Attorney Is Doing Right Now
While your reading articles online, researching calculators, trying to understand the law yourself - what do you think is happening on the other side?
Their attorney is already gathering evidence. Tax returns. Bank statements. Documentation of who paid for what during the marriage. Witness statements from friends and family about "contributions" and "sacrifices."
They're building a narrative. A story about why your spouse deserves more, for longer. A story about how YOUR success was actualy THEIR sacrifice. A story designed to trigger those 13 discretionary factors in there favor.
Every day you wait, that narrative gets stronger. Every day you wait, the evidence you could have preserved becomes harder to find. Every day you wait, your potential leverage in negotiation diminishes.
This isnt fear mongering. This is the reality of how contested divorces work in New York.
The Call That Changes Everything
Look, you've read this far because your worried. Maybe terrified. The numbers your looking at - the maintenance you might pay or might receive - will shape the next decade of your life.
The advisory guideline system means this is a fight, not a calculation. Whoever argues better wins. Whoever presents their case more effectively controls the outcome.
At Spodek Law Group, we fight these cases every day. We know the judges, the precedents, the arguments that work and the ones that fail. We know how to frame the 13 factors to protect our clients - whether thats minimizing what you pay or maximizing what you receive.
The clock started the moment divorce became a possibility. Call us at 212-300-5196. A consultation costs nothing. Waiting to call could cost you everything.
This is your financial future. The next 10, 15, 20 years of your life. The retirement you've been planning. The lifestyle you've been building.
Dont let it be decided by a calculator that doesnt even apply.
Dont let it be decided by a narrative your spouse is writing right now, while you research alone.
Call Spodek Law Group today. 212-300-5196.
